


Pine Boughs and Mistletoe

by QueenoftheRandomWord42



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Bucky and Natasha are proud cat parents, BuckyNat Secret Santa, Bumping in to you Ex and realizing you both have happily moved on AU, F/M, For diekleineelisabeth, Netflix Movie Marathons, Some minor alcohol useage in the fic, christmas party au, friends to lovers au, job hunting, making fun of Rom Com Tropes, stuck in a car au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-07
Updated: 2019-01-07
Packaged: 2019-10-06 05:58:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,285
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17339852
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/QueenoftheRandomWord42/pseuds/QueenoftheRandomWord42
Summary: Bucky and Natasha have been friends since five-year-old Bucky—only beaten out by his friendship with Steve, but that didn’t count as they had been friends since they were fetuses—got bored and crashed Natasha’s Ballet class, and Natasha backed him up to keep Bucky from getting kicked out.Now in the holiday of 2018, Bucky has been quietly pushing down his unrequited crush on Natasha after her last few romantic relationships have gone down in flames, so he’ll pine, let his feelings get buried so deep down, then someday he’ll die and it’ll be the only thing unburned in his ashes like Percy Shelley's heart.Now it’s the holiday season of 2018 and Natasha Romanoff has it all, a successful career in the Legal department of Stark Industries, charming friends—most of which are already paired up two by two (seriously what is this Noah’s ark?)—and an adoring cat, so she set’s aside her feelings for the lovable dork at her side since he’d only give her hell for it.





	Pine Boughs and Mistletoe

**Author's Note:**

  * For [stillgirlfrommars](https://archiveofourown.org/users/stillgirlfrommars/gifts).



> For the [BuckyNat Secret Santa exchange](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/BuckyNat_Secret_Santa_2018)BuckyNat Secret Santa exchange for [stillgirlfrommars or dieleineelisabeth](https://stillgirlfrommars.tumblr.com/) who sent me these prompts, and in a fit of ambition and inspiration found away to put all three into one fic ^_^  
> 1\. Movement by Hozier is such a BuckyNat song for me and I'd love to see/read something inspired by the mood it sets  
> 2\. Bucky and Nat watching Netflix Christmas movies together - they're the absolute worst but they actually enjoy watching them together during the holiday season  
> 3\. Mistletoe... just something with a mistletoe :) (bonus: a bit of pining beforehand)  
> I had a lot of fun writing this.

“Mommy, how long do we have to sit here?” Jamie Barnes whined while his mother tried to shush him. 

“Not much longer son, we’re almost done signing you up for gymnastics class, and then we’ll pick up Becca from ballet,” Winnie Barnes reassured her son, “please go back to coloring, don’t you want to give it to Stevie when we get to his house?”

“I already finished it,” Jamie muttered, tempted to flop on to the floor dramatically, but all it would get is for his mother to tell him to act his age and he’d have to sit in the corner for five minutes in time out, and the last thing Jamie wanted was to spend five minutes sitting doing nothing.

While his mother went back to filling out some paperwork and talking to the lady behind the counter with the computer, Jamie began gazing around the room and heard some pretty music from the other room. So, he began to move toward the classical music and looked inside.

He was greeted with a lot of pretty movement, girls kicking out in front of them, standing on their toes and kicking out in smooth motions, and Jamie really wanted to join, so he kicked off his shoes and snuck onto the floor.

“What are you doing?” a little girl in a red tutu and matching red hair hissed as he tried to tiptoe behind her.

“I wanted to dance too,” Jamie whispered.

“Oh, okay, uh, we need you to stand up straighter.”

“Like this?”

“Uh huh, puff out your chest a little more.”

“Kay.”

“What’s this?” the ballet instructor asked when she noticed that one of her students had shorter hair and was dressed in pants and a tee shirt instead of a leotard and tutus, the instructor stood over them like a giant vulture gazing down upon the two of them from atop a telephone pole, “I’m afraid this is for students only, where’s your mommy?”

“He is a student, he’s always been here,” the girl defended.

“Oh yeah, how so?” the vulture lady asked.

“He’s dancing with us, and this is a dance class.”

“But he’s a boy,”

Jamie scrunched up his face and was about to walk out when he felt a small hand grasp his shoulder.

“So, what? My daddy was a ballet dancer before I was born, and he’s a boy.” Jamie’s defender argued, and the Instructor pursed her lips but didn’t fault the argument.

“Alright, he can stay, and if his mommy signs him up he can attend the next ones,” the instructor said, looking up and Jamie looked up to see Winnie Barnes and the lady behind the counter staring at him.

“It’s either this or Gymnastics Jamie, which means you won’t do gymnastics with Stevie,” Winnie offered, “But you could dance with your new friend?”

“I’m Natalia Romanoff, but my daddy calls me Natasha!” Natasha exclaimed, “Because I’m a Christmas present.”

“I’m Jamie Buchanan Barnes,” Jamie offered. “I’m an Easter present.”

Or at least Easter sometimes happens on his birthday…

“Did you hatch from an egg?”

“Did you come out of a present?”

“Yes.”

“Then me too.”

“So what will it be Jamie dear?” Winnie asked again, glancing at the clerk for the dance and gymnastics academy.

“Ballet,” Jamie decided, “I see Stevie every day at kindergarten.”

It proved to be a smart decision on Jamie’s part, as little Stevie wound up breaking his nose in a somersaulting accident when he crashed into a little Tony Stark, and Jamie was in the next room over with Natasha and they were able to bring ice and candy over to the feuding five-year-olds.

Such grudges thankfully were gone an hour later, and Tony joined them after class to wait for their mommies, daddy, and in Tony’s case his butler, to pick them up.

After the first session of ballet, came summer vacation, then first grade where Jamie was one of six “James” and wound up changing his nickname to “Bucky” from his middle name Buchanan. Natasha sat next to him for most of the first grade, Stevie on his other side. Clint Barton from gymnastics often joined them on the playground, while Tony and one of the other James, who went by “Rhodey”, would make cool structures out of blocks.

They stayed friends all throughout elementary school, middle school, high school, and college. From the time Natasha dumped a cup of water down Bucky’s pants in solidarity from an accident Steve had, to Steve’s anticlimactic bisexual revelation freshman year of college where Steve realized he was torn between sleeping with the English International student Peggy Carter, and his jogging buddy Sam Wilson.

Bucky just voiced his solidarity and unwavering support while trying to snipe Natasha’s spy character during Team Fortress Two, only for her team’s sniper (played by Clint in the other room) to get him instead. Then muttered that Steve could have waited another week before he passed Natasha a twenty.

Natasha was there for Bucky when he had his heart broken when his high school sweetheart Dot dumped him shortly before Senior Prom. Natasha went as his date to spite her, though Bucky spent most of that time crying into his punch every time he saw Dot with her new boyfriend until Natasha gave him a punch of her own into left “steel like” bicep.

Steve got banned from Prom during junior year when he got into a fist fight with a boy who tried to spike a girl’s punch, but unfortunately, Mr. Schmidt was not convinced, so Steve couldn’t go.

Bucky and Natasha stayed friends even after Natasha dated a few other guys, including Tony Stark one summer junior year of college, Clint Barton during one quick fling before Clint fell asleep in a rental car that got carjacked by the woman he’d later marry—the only reason Laura Barton nee Bishop didn’t go to jail was because her father paid a lot of money, and Clint was too smitten to press charges on kidnapping—and Bruce Banner two Christmases ago.

Then, after being just friends for twenty-three years, Bucky came to a revelation that his feelings for Natasha might be strictly more than platonic when she pulled up a cute YouTube video about a singing animated spider pig voiced by a popular comedian, and Bucky realized he was probably the only person on earth she’d tolerate him teasing her about it.

Granted if he had mentioned anything, he knew he’d wake up with his hand in a bowl of warm water if he said anything, so refrained from doing so.

As the months wore on, Bucky pushed his crush for Nat down, deep down where it would never see the light of day, where his feelings would harden from the heat and pressure into a solid shape and maybe someday when he dies, it would be the only thing left behind in his cremated ashes, like Percy Shelley's calcified heart.

What Bucky didn’t account for was for everything to change after a weird piece of gossip arrived in their group of friends from Los Vegas.

000

Natasha sat on Bucky’s feet while Liho purred happily on her lap, as she scratched his chin, his green eyes shut in ecstasy.

Alpine, Bucky’s white cat seemed content to sniff around the back of the couch before deciding that sticking his cold nose into his owner’s ear was more interesting, causing the man to gasp in the middle of sending out his latest resume to potential employers.

Natasha felt his feet sift under her and leaned against his legs a little bit firmly to remind him that she was there. Liho shot Bucky an annoyed look, clearly having been jostled by Bucky and his brother’s antics and curled up into a determinedly tight ball and trucked his paws in and shut his eyes. Natasha simply began gently petting around her cat’s ears.

Bucky hummed, “There’s an opening for Wakanda Inc, that’s a lot like my old job, but I don’t know if my resume alone would be enough to entice them…”

“Apply then, and write a cover letter, I know you’re good at them when you put your mind to them,” Natasha shrugged, she was proud when Bucky took a stand and quit Hydra Inc when he realized his manager Pierce was manipulating him to ignore his rights as a worker for increased productivity, and tried to talk Bucky in to what he suspected was corporate espionage.

Unfortunately, Bucky quit without a new job lined up. He gave up his old apartment to live with his current roommates until he got a new one, but the broken trust in employers and prolonged unemployment was taking a toll on Bucky’s mental health.

Bucky nodded, and Natasha looked away to avoid seeing Bucky bite his lower lip absentmindedly as he proceeded to apply to the job. Bucky didn’t need to know how much he looked like an adorable dork when he did that, or that Natasha thought it was cute. She had a reputation to protect after all.

“So, Thor sent out that email about the annual Odinson family party, are you going to be working that night? It’ll be on Christmas Eve,” Natasha announced to the silent room while Bucky typed up another cover letter.

Natasha could hear him quietly cursing Hydra Inc. under his breath, about how past Bucky was a naïve child to accept that job offer but he had been young, just out of college and desperate for employment, unaware of the company’s dirty reputation until it was too late.

She could hear his opinion on how it was a great thing that Hydra Inc. went down, Bucky thankfully leaving just before Pierce and Rumlow were exposed for their money laundering scheme, but unfortunately, that meant half of Bucky’s references were in jail, or in court now, and the other half were obsolete.

Annoyed that her friend was stuck in his elaborate backstory, Natasha leaned up and poked her friend on his knee, “Are you coming or not?”

“What?” Bucky asked, peering out from behind his laptop, and Natasha noticed the gleam in Alpine’s eye.

“The Christmas party, on Christmas Eve? Also, Alpine’s getting ideas…”

“Al!” Bucky exclaimed when the cat tried to launch himself on to Bucky’s very warm computer, shoving it to the side just in time for the cat to land on his lap, but Natasha could hear a twinge of pain, so she assumed Alpine’s claws might have sunk into a rather tender bit. Al leaped off looking startled, and both humans felt bad for scaring the poor thing.

After Bucky tried to coax his cat back to him—“Come back Fuzz-butt, I didn’t mean it!”—only for Alpine to curl up and sit in his cat tree, green eyes peering out from the little cave, Bucky gave up and remembered that Natasha had asked him a question.

She repeated herself.

“Oh, yeah I’m open that night, I’m trading a few shifts with Luis and Scott so I won’t arrive smelling like pitch and pine.”

“That’s good,” Natasha observed and went back to petting her cat while he ignored his brother taking refuge in the cat tree.

“Are we still up for the all-day Netflix marathon the day after?” Bucky asked, and she nodded. “Mom and Dad are not going to be free until Christmas dinner when the rest of the family will be flying in from Shelbyville. Becca and Mike will be bringing the kids so Alpine’s staying here.”

“And your roommates don’t mind?”

“Steve and Sam? No, it’s going to be their first Christmas as a married couple, so Alpine’s probably going to ignore them while they celebrate,” Bucky shrugged.

The Christmas Movie Marathon was a tradition after Natasha and Bruce broke up almost three years ago, and Bucky was there with a bottle of Vodka and an awkward offer of making fun of rom-com clichés while Natasha cried her heartbreak out.

That Christmas had been rough in particular as a snowstorm kept Bucky’s family in Shelbyville, and his parents were visiting their daughter and grandchildren.

A rather fierce argument that scared Bruce more than it scared Natasha made Bruce call their relationship quits on Christmas Eve. So, two lonely—and Natasha’s case heartbroken—individuals started the tradition, last year adding sleepy kittens and bingo cards

“I’m there! Want me to bring the dice to add some randomness to the stupidity?” Natasha cheered. The twenty-sided die she was talking about was to introduce randomness, when Bucky entered in “Christmas movies” Natasha assigned the first twenty movies a number, rolled the dice, and Bucky would select the movie, then they would watch it Mystery Science Theater 3000 style.

“Only if you want to add the bad movie trope bingo cards and the vodka,” Bucky laughed, and Natasha nodded. The bingo cards were full of bad rom-com movie tropes, and when the trope came up, they’d take quarter a shot (because they weren’t in college anymore and five shots meant a trip to the hospital for alcohol poisoning), and place the empty cup on the trope on the card, the loser usually getting really drunk and the winner would make the loser sleep with the ugly orange teddy bear Bucky’s niece gave him when she was four.

“Oh, you’re on, and you’re gonna lose this year and I will text your niece the pic of your Christmas afternoon nap with Lord Fluffkiss!” Natasha threatened, but honestly, she’d probably curl up next to Bucky afterward and fall into a vodka-fueled nap herself, she always won, probably because Bucky always underestimated her alcohol tolerance.

She’d never admit under pain of death that Barnes was cute when he was sleeping, and last year the cats—then young kittens that she and Bucky found in a cardboard box labeled “free kittens” on a cold afternoon in late November—seemed to love that the alcohol made their humans warmer than normal and would join in on the afternoon nap. The nap would end with the humans waking up freezing because the alcohol made them drop their core body temperatures, but that was future Bucky and Natasha’s problem.

“Anything but that,” Bucky deadpanned, and any more teasing was cut short when the front door’s lock made a clicking sound and swung open, revealing Steve, buried alive in his oversized downy parka and pants, his husband Sam behind him, both with their arms loaded with groceries.

“Ah good, you’re both here, we just came across Tony today at the store and you won’t believe what he had to say,” Steve announced.

“What? Did Tony renounce all technology and move to Nepal to commune with monks and achieve Nirvana like Strange did?” Bucky asked while Natasha held down a snort. Steve and Sam rolled their eyes in unison. 

“Apparently Tony got back into contact with a mutual friend, and it turns out Thor invited him to the party,” Sam shrugged, pulling off his parka and hanging it up on the hook. “The kind of mutual friend who went MIA about what almost three years ago? Thor had some family business in Reno, and he bumped into Bruce in Los Vegas.”

“What was Bruce doing in Vegas?” Bucky asked, and Natasha froze to contain her surprise, as well as the odd feeling, not heartbreak, she’s felt that in the past, but a confusing uncertainty of unresolved but abstract feelings.

She remembered Thor talking a few weeks ago about a trip he and his estranged brother Loki—or no longer estranged? The Facebook posts were rather cryptic, almost as if Loki didn’t want to admit to anything—Thor mentioned something about his disowned older sister going to court about something that happened before Thor was born. Thor went instead of their recently deceased father, and whatever happened in Vegas might have stayed in Vegas, but it was enough for the brothers to decide to restart the Christmas party tradition that meant so much to their late mother.

“Tony doesn’t know all the details, and I got a feeling Thor and Bruce will probably tell us what happened at the party. Tony felt we should let Natasha know her ex is going to be there, just in case she didn’t want to go or something,” Steve explained kindly.

“Oh no, I’m going, I’m not about to let some Ex ruin my Christmas eve.” Natasha declared.

“That’s not all, Bruce had a Vegas Wedding, Thor was the witness. Tony’s met her, and all he could say to describe her was and I quote ‘oh my fucking god’,” Sam added.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Bucky snapped.

Steve shrugged, “I have no clue.”

That meant Bruce had moved on, and Natasha was torn, she was glad for one a moment that Bruce was probably doing better, or as well as a Vegas Wedding could imply. On the other she wondered if the woman could handle it when Bruce lost his temper, he was a man who feared his own anger. Natasha learned that first hand, likely because he was terrified, he’d revert into the kind of man his father was.

Natasha’s phone beeped, and she sighed.

“I gotta take Liho home, tonight’s Jiu-Jitsu,” she got up, picking up Liho as she did before the cat realized his visit to his brother’s apartment was over, and placed him into his special backpack carrier, insulated so the cold New York December wouldn’t bother him until she got him home.

And she’ll probably figure out her emotions by the time she was done working them out of her system during the sparing period of Jiu-Jitsu.

Liho cried on the steps down, but when they got outside, he decided his efforts would be better off put to keeping warm snuggled against Natasha’s back and going back asleep until she reached her apartment, and while she got her gym closes and Gi and brown belt ready, Liho left his carrier and began grooming on the sofa in her living room.

Once she was ready, pulling back on her trench coat, wallet and keys, she left with a few gentle scratches behind Liho’s ears and left the apartment to reach the nearest gym with a jiu-jitsu dojo, the perfect place to work out any stress and annoyances.

Also, today was the 17th, which meant it was gym fees day, and Natasha was just thankful her insurance paid for most of her gym membership because this particular gym was expensive with the rent around here.

Which kinda peeved Natasha a little when Mick, behind the counter, explained to her in great detail why her insurance company was reducing coverage come the new year.

“Are you kidding me?” She asked as Mick shrugged and shook his head sadly, then he opened his mouth to bring up some of the more inexpensive gym memberships, which unfortunately didn’t cover her jiu-jitsu class before she gently cut him off. “No, it’s fine, I’ll figure something out, we’ve got until New Year.”

She wasn’t going to be rude to Mick, he was a nice guy and this wasn’t his fault.

Natasha tried to think where in her budget she’d cut corners to make up the difference—Liho wouldn’t mind generic cat food and kitty litter right? —while she stashed her shoes and coat into her locker and pinned the padlock key into the sports bra strap under her shirt and gi when she entered the dojo room where Sensei Korg, gym owner, and jiu-jitsu instructor, came in with his coral belt and a handful of pamphlets.

“Hey everyone, before we begin, I have a couple of quick announcements,” Korg began, his soft voice and New Zealand accent filling the room, creating some quick silence which Korg seemed pleased and surprised to receive. “First of all, we’re always looking for new members, and I decided to give people a ten percent discount if they bring a friend in to join our gym and our class.”

The room filled with silence and Natasha latched on to the idea of the discount, mentally trying to figure out if the ten percent discount would be enough for the increased gym fees she’d have to pay.

Korg kept talking while she tried to do the math in her head, “Second of all, the gym will be closed the week of Christmas and the week of new years because me and my mates will be visiting family in New Zealand, but we’ll open up again on the seventh of the new year. We request that everyone stays safe, enjoy their holidays, and stay active because that will be the best way to deal holiday stresses, so yeah, let’s start with warm-ups now yeah?”

Natasha nodded to herself, suddenly realizing she had two weeks to talk some friends into joining, Steve might be an option, he loved martial arts for such a little guy, but some classes fell on their Weekly Date Night, which Sam made clear was non-negotiable under most circumstances, and Steve had eagerly agreed to that before they got married…

Natasha began her falling drills with Hope and Janet Van Dyne, a mother-daughter duo who introduced Natasha jiu-jitsu in the first place when Natasha was first hired in Stark Industries Legal department.

The rest of the class passed through the night, and Natasha came home to her apartment too tired and sore to think about her jiu-jitsu finances or the complicated feelings her heart dragged forward when it came to Bucky’s lower lip or Bruce’s complex relationships.

*-*-*

Bucky’s shift at work, temporary seasonal work with a mounting expiration date on the horizon made for a tense afternoon. Well, tense outside of the drama that some customers brought up that was considered normal for retail work, and his coworker Luis had a family anecdote that he felt he needed to share with Bucky about a cousin of his.

“So, they exchanged numbers, and Diego asked out his crush for some coffee, and that’s why Diego’s not going to join my family for New Years, but they don’t mind, they’ve got him over for Christmas.”

“Is there a point to this?” Bucky asked when his coworker finally stopped for air.

“Yeah, I’m just saying if you see an opportunity, just take it, in both work and romance, I know you’re waffling over that Wakanda job man, and I’m rooting for you and that Natasha chick,” Luis answered regaining the wind while he nodded encouragingly while straightening the four-feet-and-under Christmas trees by the register. Bucky was starting to regret that rather strong heart to heart he gave Luis during their early coffee break that morning.

Luis sounded like some of his well-meaning family members, and Luis was one of the few people who figured out how hard Bucky was trying to conceal his feelings for Natasha.

In his hard Percy Shelley Heart.

“Oh no, see I what’s going on here, one Natasha and I are just friends, and I’m not about to fuck it up because I feel more tingly about it than she does, especially when her worst relationships are ones where she’s friends with the guy first,” okay that might have been a bit of an exaggeration, but it still made his point. Bucky continued to argue, “and two—”

“And two I need you to stop yakking like a pair of old ladies and actually do the job I pay you, two clowns to do,” snapped a third voice from behind them, and crossing his arms was their employer, Hank Pym. The older man looked mildly irritated at them, but since Bucky was manning the register and Luis was organizing the miniature trees, Bucky knew that the man was complaining just for the sake of complaining. “Barnes, I need Laing to secure a tree for aisle six, which means I need you to haul an eight-footer to a customer’s car, and lord help you if you so much as bend a pine branch.”

“Yes sir,” Bucky nodded and switched out of the register with Luis over to where Scott was chatting in a friendly manner with a family of four as he was wrapping their eight-foot Christmas tree with twine for transport. A second family stood on the fringes, waiting for Scott to be open, and Bucky approached. “How’s it going folks?”

Scott nodded and said to the first family, “And this is Barnes, he’ll help you get your tree to the car.”

“Are you sure you don’t need any help carrying this thing?” the wife, judging by the ring on her finger and the man whose hand she was holding, asked frowning at her spouse like she was disappointed in him for not helping more, but it wasn’t Bucky’s job to fix marriages.

“No need ma’am, it’s my pleasure, and I’ve carried heavier,” Bucky soothed with an easy grin and easily picked up the wrapped up tree like it was something he had been doing a lot since before Thanksgiving—Some man wanted to use a large tree as a big f-you to his mother-in-law this year and Pym was willing to hire Bucky on the spot when he showed up desperate with a resume, never mind that his CV said nothing about hauling trees—and tilted his head as if to ask the family to lead the way. The children giggled and in the eagerness of Christmas began to prance their way to their car, chatting about what they wanted for Christmas.

“Are you sure you don’t need any help?” the harried husband asked, a couple of bungee cords in hand to secure the tree to his sedan once they reached it.

“No, thank you, sir, I appreciate the offer, but I’ve got a guy coming to help, so sit back and enjoy the holidays,” Bucky said with a smile and held his hands out to accept the cords.

Luis helped around the back side of the car, handing the family their receipt as he passed as the worked to secure the tree to the bike rack on top of the tree, the kids, eager to get out of the cold were already clambering inside the car to get out of the wind while their parents watched.

The family clambered into the car, and the buzzer on Bucky’s watch went off, meaning he had completed his assigned eight hours.

“All set!” Bucky cheered when Luis went back to help out another family, this time a family of five with what looked like an extra adult to help wrangle a toddler who kept trying to bolt amongst the trees like a creature of the fae.

With that minor task done, Bucky watched the last family he helped drive off with satisfaction, walked to the register to clock out, depositing the eternally sticky leather gloves in its cubby hole, and now off duty.

As he got on to the bus, he shut his eyes, ready to head home to cuddle Alpine, and spend the rest of the night not worrying about anything whatsoever, even if he knew in reality, he’d probably spend most of it staring at a blank document page that was supposed to be a succinct and well-written cover letter.

He got to his apartment with no other distractions, and as he reached into his pocket to unlock the front door, he could hear his roommates chatting inside, so instead of unlocking the already unlocked door, Bucky just let himself inside quietly.

“I’m telling you, Steve, I doubt it’ll happen unless something else gives,” Sam sighed, while Steve looked doggedly determined. “He won’t put a move on without a good reason.”

“Whatever it is, I agree with Steve,” Bucky interrupted, and almost startling his roommates, causing a bowl of popcorn to clatter on to the floor while Steve sadly draped the popcorn garland on the coffee table and proceed to sweep the mess up.

Alpine already made quick work of the flying popcorn by pouncing on a few stray pieces, utterly smashing them into useless flat kernels before turning to his favorite human for Bucky to scoop up into his arms.

“You’re home early,” Sam observed as he got up to help his husband, sending Steve a strangely triumphant look, which Bucky chose to ignore, even if it meant that Bucky had somehow proved Sam’s cryptic mystic point.

“Got lucky and caught an earlier bus,” Bucky shrugged, Alpine aggressively purring against his arms and chest, “So what were you two talking about?”

There was an awkward silence for a moment, sending each other looks before Sam said aloud “The Christmas party coming up, I think there might be a chance of an argument springing up over politics, Steve disagrees.”

Steve nodded, but the frown in his features, only readable to people who really know Steve, like Bucky, would know to decipher as Steve’s not telling the whole truth, but Steve wouldn’t keep silent against something he was morally opposed to.

“Alright then,” Bucky shrugged and walked further into the apartment, depositing Alpine onto the sofa next to Sam.

“Thor also asked Sam and me to come over to their family cabin early to help out with getting ready, and we got a request of our pies, and the oven’s out, so Thor’s lending access to his oven. This might also mean that we’ll probably get a chance to meet Bruce and this “Val” first, we have no idea what she is like,” Steve shrugged, “All we’ve got to go on is a quote ‘oh my fucking god’ unquote from Tony.”

“Which could mean anything from being insanely attractive, to completely crazy, knowing Tony,” Sam replied looking at Steve with a slightly raised eyebrow.

“It could mean anything really, we won’t know until we meet her,” Bucky pointed out, Tony had a flair for the overdramatic.

“Go take a shower man, you smell like you’ve been first basing it with a noble fir,” Sam grumbled after he caught a whiff of Bucky’s work jacket covered in pitch.

“Thanks, Sam, I could have just taken a bough for you if you had just asked,” Bucky teased with a really bad pun, and then gave Sam a one-armed hug, just to be an asshole.

“You sap,” Sam muttered, pushing Bucky away gently.

“Please, don’t make any more puns,” Steve groaned with an eye roll.

“Alright, no need to pitch a fit about it,” Bucky snickered making sure that he made one more last pun than Sam, and Steve stifled a groan, “besides you married the man who started it.”

Sam just gave Steve a shit-eating grin, and Steve tried to stifle a snicker, which Bucky had long since grown used to since Steve and Sam had started dating seriously.

Bucky quickly evacuated to the bathroom before he would witness more marital bliss. Bucky loved and respected his friends, but sometimes they could just be a bit much.

Alpine stayed and draped himself all over Sam’s lap, leaving white fur all over Sam’s jeans, so Bucky left his cat with the roommates, while he started up the shower.

His phone pinged, and it was Scott, apologizing for the inconvenience, but it turned out he and Hope had made arrangements to attend Cassie’s ballet recital of the Nutcracker, and he needed Bucky to work two hours longer than they agreed on.

Bucky acquiesced but warned Scott that he owed him two hours that Bucky might take advantage of on the twenty-third, Hank would let them do this as long as it was cleared by him beforehand and that someone was manning the Christmas tree stall.

Bucky got into the shower as Scott spammed his text inbox with “Thank you so very much”, and “I’m am so sorry, man”s.

Clean and relaxed, Bucky pulled on his sweatpants on, and then his phone buzzed in his pants pocket, and he pulled it up to get a text notification. This time it wasn’t Scott.

**Natasha** : So, what do think about Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu?

**Bucky:** As a concept, or…

**Natasha:** Cute

**Natasha:** My sensei is having a new promotion where new members can join at a discount

Bucky considered, he really wanted to join, it sounded like it’d be something fun to occupy his mind, and might look good on some resumes, but not until he had stable employment, and definitely not until he could afford the membership fees at Nat’s favorite gym.

**Bucky:** Sorry, I can’t T_T, my job at Pym’s Pines ends at the New Years and I’ve heard nothing from the other job prospects yet.

**Natasha:** That’s fine

**Natasha:** Just thought I’d ask.

**Natasha:** How was work?

**Bucky:** Witnessed three married disputes, one on price, and two on tree shape?? got called a beefcake by a bitter suburbanite, and stopped a kid from peeing on the trees before calling over his embarrassed grandma

**Natasha:** Crazy

**Bucky:** Yep. Luis and Scott said “Hi” btw ^_^

**Natasha:** Tell them I said hi back. Any luck on the job hunt? Did you hear back from Wakanda Inc?

**Bucky:** I haven’t finished the cover letter…

**Natasha:** Bucky!

**Bucky:** I’m finishing it tonight

**Natasha:** Well, the party’s coming up, so we’ve got something to look forward to

**Bucky:** Definitely! Steve and Sam are leaving early, and I’m going to leave my shift later than I wanted, so I’ll be a little late.

**Natasha:** Wanna ride to the party?

Bucky flushed down a blush and was about to text back yes when Steve knocked on the bathroom door.

“Hey Buck, are you alright in there? You got kinda quiet and dinner’s almost ready,” Steve called.

“I’m fine, I’ll be right out.”

“Alright, we’re having chicken soup.”

Bucky finished texting his reply.

He put his phone away, and pulled his sweatshirt on, his skin already riddled with goosebumps after the residual heat of the shower dissipated into the bathroom’s weaker insulation and the window cracked open a tiny bit for ventilation and mold prevention, Bucky confident the steam had already vented out, shut the window tightly to keep the heat in.

Alpine was already begging Bucky, the human who was his sole source of food, by standing by his food bowl and giving him a sharp hungry meow.

“Alright, I’ve got ya Fuzz-butt,” Bucky muttered, laughing at the quarter-sized bald spot on the food bowl, and how Alpine clearly saw it as a crisis his human needed to rectify right now, or he’d resort to stealing human food like he tried to do as a small kitten.

Cat fed, meal consumed at the kitchen table—because they agreed that not eating in the living room was a good idea, and all three men liked having a clean living-space—and dishes are done, Bucky once again pulled up his cover letter on his laptop and stared at the half-formed sentences on his laptop screen, Alpine napping on his human’s lap.

Bucky tried typing about how he managed to be exceptional in his field, but wound up struggling to write, trying to skirt around the fact that his last job had him standing up to his boss and quitting, something he was sure that could blacklist him, and might be the reason why he had been unemployed since just after Halloween.

His phone buzzed again for the first time since his shower, and he pulled it up.

**Natasha:** Hey, have you sent into that resume? I looked into the company, and I think you might have a chance with this place

**Bucky:** I’m almost done, I’ll let you know when I send it in

And with that Bucky just finished his cover letter with a group project he had excelled in leading during his college days, and hoped that what he wrote would be enough to entice an employer.

**Bucky:** Sending the application and cover letter in 3…..

**Bucky:** 2…..

**Bucky:** 1!

And Bucky clicked submit to the last of the application process, sending his resume, an employee survey he spent all of last night filling out, consented to the criminal background check while hoping that Hydra hadn’t destroyed his chances and the cover letter, he spent all day crafting.

**Bucky:** Happy now?

**Natasha:** Very, I’ll see you later, night ;)

*-*-*

Natasha spent the rest of the week going through most of her friends to see who would be more interested in Jiu-Jitsu.

Hope and Janet Van Dyne are already in her class, so that rules them out.

Same with the Carter cousins, and Peggy Carter already recruited a few new people, impressively fast.

Tony was more interested in boxing, and his boxing partner Happy was more than happy for Tony not adding more martial arts to his arsenal of “cheating”. Pepper had her tai chi classes at the same time as Natasha’s jiu-jitsu class, and Steve and Sam had further schedule conflicts so she was right in not asking them.

Clint and his sister-in-law Kate coached an archery team that his two eldest kids were part of, but in a stroke of pure parenting genus, coached them like any other member of the team. The kids called him and Aunt Kate “Coach Barton” and “Coach Bishop” respectively during practice, and few people realized that the Barton kids were related to the coaches.

Natasha had watched a few of their competitions, like a good Aunt, and unfortunately, Jiu-Jitsu classes would compete with some of the archery competitions, especially if the kids made the State Championships like Kate Bishop was implying when Natasha called.

Plus, the whole family was currently in Iowa with a branch of the Bishop family in a “charming farm” in the Iowa countryside until New Year’s, the Barton kids were eager to play in the snow. Clint wasn’t going to complain as his in-laws were paying for renting the farmhouse. Natasha sent them her love over Skype and promised to give the kids their presents after New Year’s.

She even got in touch with her old foster father, a Detective—and former ballet dancer—Fury, the man who uncovered Hydra’s money laundering scheme, which apparently Bucky’s quitting lead Fury to the right clues to find the evidence needed to get a warrant for the CEOs of Hydra. But she figured out when was the best time of day to call, like when Liho was napping under her miniature fake tree like a dragon coiled around his evergreen hoard after the last jiu-jitsu class of the year.

“Hey, my gym’s having a promotion for the jiu-jitsu class,” Natasha began with bated breath, “and you mentioned how nice it would be to spend more time together and…”

“Natasha, I’m going to have cut you off right there,” Nick interrupted her firmly. “I’m too retired to afford that expensive gym of yours, and unfortunately, I’ve got a few new cases coming up, and I had to turn down a background check and instead doubled as a character reference when an old associate’s son called me about a sketchy cover letter, turns out it was just poorly written.”

“Oh,” Natasha nodded to herself, not surprised but mildly disappointed, “I get it.”

“I would, however, be pleased to spend some more time with you in getting a new battery for that Corvette of yours,” Fury added.

“That works, but I swear it’ll be fine until New Years, plus I can get my own battery,” Natasha pointed out, “And don’t we have the lunch planned on my Birthday? We can get it then.”

“The Department-wide Christmas party is still open if you don’t want to face your ex-boyfriend,” Fury offered.

“Thanks, Nick, but I think I can handle it, and I’ll leave early if I can’t,” Natasha said, slight gratitude replacing the mild disappointment she felt, and wondering if she should talk to her supervisor for more hours so she could afford for the increase in gym fees.

“Good enough, I’ll see you at lunch on Boxing Day, I’ve got a box of stuff we’ll donate on our way out, tell Barnes I said ‘hi’,” Nick finished before hanging up.

*-*-*

So Christmas Eve came along at a fast pace on a bright, cheery, and cold day and Bucky hurried out of work at five thirty, and had to rush to his apartment, wash off the pine pitch, feed Alpine, and pulled on his dark skinny jeans, and fluffy white Fisherman’s sweater before grabbing his scarf, hat, and extra thick down jacket and vest, as it was going to be freezing (seriously, the weather forecast said it was going to be clear skies and 32 degrees Fahrenheit or 0 degrees Celsius, the freezing point of water, and Bucky did not fancy being frozen solid tonight). Alpine curled up on top of the heating vent, watching his human with half-lidded eyes, telling his human that he was warm and content.

“Love you too, bud,” Bucky muttered, pulling his hair back into a tight ponytail and gave his cat a farewell head scratch before Natasha sent him a text announcing her arrival.

Bucky left the apartment, locking the door and to the street where Natasha waited in her little black Corvette.

“Hey Stranger, what’s a dork like you doing in a place like this?” Natasha greeted with a teasing grin.

“Funny, I could ask you the same question,” Bucky quipped back and clambered in. He caught a few glimpses of her jewelry and she looked really pretty in her jacket and dress, her rose lipstick and dark purple eyeshadow made her eyes and lips pop in the low light, and Bucky ripped his eyes away so he wouldn’t stare at her like a creep.

He slid into his seat and shut the car door, and got comfortable as he slid his seatbelt into place, and Natasha grinned while she turned on the radio.

“How was work?” She asked.

“Tiring, but I’m glad it’s over, and you?” Bucky muttered.

“Unremarkable, but Liho discovered wrapping paper and tinsel garland strands, so I had to pack it up or risk my cat getting tangled in his new playthings,” She shrugged, and they were off, heading out of town, to the highway with idle chatter.

“That sucks, the things we sacrifice for our cats, I had to turn the heater down a little, so that way Al won’t burn his little butt on the heating vents, He’s taken to napping on them,” Bucky shrugged.

“Wow, that’s a hell of a sacrifice for you, you hate the cold.”

“Well, Steve and Sam won’t complain about the lower utility bill, and Alpine won’t get hurt, so wins all around.” Bucky shrugged, and to his delight, after hearing way too much Christmas music at work, he was delighted Natasha found some real music on the radio waves.

“Thanks,” he replied and Natasha shrugged.

“Can’t get too sick of Christmas music we still have our Netflix Holiday Movie Bingo tomorrow,” Natasha teased.

“Nice, any movie catching your eye in particular?”

“You know the rules Barnes, we have to watch the movies at random, no tampering or trope predicting involved,” She chided him as the roads turned from city street to a more rural environment where the properties were measured in acres instead of square feet, and your neighbors were possibly a mile away at most.

Bucky noticed the headlights brightened a little when the amount of traffic and ambient light went down, and there were a few moments he saw the eerie green glow that was wildlife eyes as they passed.

The radio pulled up a rather soothing ballad about a man singing about how someone moved him, likely emotionally but the movement could have also inspired the artist to actually move and do something, it was, pun not intended, rather moving.

Then Natasha slammed on her breaks when something dark brown and massive shot across their field of vision, and she expertly banked around the large animal and got back into their lane.

Bucky gave slow clap.

Then they heard a bang and Bucky felt the car tilt a little.

“Damnit! Those tires are new!” Natasha exclaimed as she pulled over, turning on the emergency lights to alert other drivers of their stationary presence. “Make yourself useful and help me get the spare out.”

Bucky got out to face the biting cold without complaint, mostly because he knew Natasha wouldn’t appreciate it as she opened her car trunk to pull out the spare tire and jack and Bucky did what he could to provide manual labor, mainly open car doors and hold the socket wrench while Natasha shoved him to the side.

“Still, mad skills avoiding that moose back there,” Bucky grumbled as Natasha made him kneel on the cold pavement so she could get a good angle to use the wrench to get the jack to rise up over the flat tire so they could exchange it for the spare.

“It wasn’t a moose, Barnes, and you know it, it was a deer at most,” Natasha rolled her eyes and gave the jack a good hard turn, “Remind me to put an automated jack on the birthday list.”

Bucky paused, he already got Natasha her birthday gift, after a childhood of her birthday blending with Christmas, as an adult with money, she tried really hard to separate the two events.

“Did you text Steve?” Natasha grunted, either electing to ignore Bucky’s hesitation or didn’t notice it as she made another quarter turn, the Corvette tilted up and the flat tire was officially off the ground a few inches.

“I am now,” Bucky muttered, the last thing he wanted to have happened was for Steve to worry, and Steve worried about Bucky a lot. “What should I tell him?”

“That we went toe to toe with an elk and won? What do you think?” Bucky instead typed that they were delayed by a car tire, but that they were already on top of it and should be arriving in about twenty-five minutes instead of fifteen minutes like they had planned and put his phone away before he could see Steve’s reply.

“It was clearly not an Elk, white-tailed deer at least,” Natasha insisted.

“Still you drove like a badass avoiding it,” Bucky muttered, and he could have sworn he saw Natasha blush in the low light.

“Shut it,” She grumbled, but Bucky knew she was pleased despite herself, “Now are you going to help me?”

“Right, Bucky muttered as they removed the lug nuts and hubcap before easing the flat tire off its bolts and replacing it with the spare, hubcap and lug nuts and the spare tire took the weight of the car once they released the jack.

“Sweet, now on to the party,” Natasha cheered, stashing the tire in the trunk of the car and slamming the trunk closed before the emergency lights and the headlights of the car shut off.

“Son of a bitch, no, please no,” Natasha moaned, rushing to the driver’s seat to turn the ignition.

Nothing.

Bucky realized with a sinking gut that they were stuck out here, with no source of heat with someone who he was trying to suppress his feelings for.

“What’s wrong?” Bucky asked aloud.

“The battery’s dead, damn it, don’t tell Nick, he doesn’t need to know he’s right.”

“I’m sure he’ll find out anyway, there’s no hiding anything from Nick Fury,” Bucky pulled out his phone, “I’ll text Steve.”

Natasha nodded, with a second car they could jump-start her car and head to the party, but it would take a long time before they could arrive at the party, but that would mean more time out here, with their primary source of heat gone…

And if they were at the party too late, Thor would insist they spend the night, which would mean ducking out of Odinson family festivities come morning, and less time spent on the Netflix Christmas Movie Marathon before Bucky would have to duck out for his family dinner, and dodge questions from his mother about his state of employment, and if he was seeing anyone.

And he might miss the Odinson family’s reenactment of the Gavle goat war, where Thor would build the straw goat, and Loki would embrace his Swedish roots and try to burn it down while Thor would try to protect it because he liked goats.

Nobody knows how this family tradition started.

Bucky’s phone buzzed again.

**Steve:** The Calvary is on its way, sit tight and stay warm

*-*-*

The cold still air had Natasha and Bucky waiting inside the car, using their body heat to warm the car now that the battery wasn’t powering the heater, and Natasha could see Bucky shiver.

Bucky had always hated the cold since he was a kid, and once when Bucky tried to learn scuba diving, and he, unfortunately, froze twenty feet under the water when some bad advice made him even colder when the cotton tee shirt pulled his body heated water away from his skin in a reverse form of insulation.

Natasha remembered seeing him signal “I’m too cold” to her and their instructor, and both slowly ascended him to the boat until he warmed up and tried again the next weekend. She remembered the bad cold he got afterward and as she brought some borscht, he swore that he and the cold were mortal enemies. 

“Are you alright?” She asked.

“I’m fine, I’ve got my coat, what about you?” Bucky answered quickly, and Natasha would have believed him if his teeth hadn’t been chattering.

“I’m fine, still got the Russian constitution.” She muttered, but her coat was unfortunately designed to keep her warm from between a warm car to a warm building, her perfect trench coat was a bit thinner than Bucky’s downy overcoat. So, Natasha glanced at the clock and worked to keep her perfect poker face.

She pulled her arms a little closer to her body to keep them warm, and then she heard a little bit of rustling next to her, and white, grey, fleece scarf with little red wolves playing in the snow entered her field of vision.

“Here,” Bucky grunted and draped it over her shoulder, “Pulls the outfit together.”

Natasha rewrapped the scarf over her neck and face and tucked the edges into her coat. She could smell Bucky’s cologne, deodorant, and his own natural smell, and she tried not to inhale too deeply, even if the scarf smelled really nice and familiar.

“Thanks,” She said, her voice muffled a little by the scarf and she was thankful the scarf covered her cheeks, the last thing she wanted was for him to assume she was blushing.

They sat in awkward silence, and Natasha saw a few twitches from Bucky’s side like he was trying to stifle some shivering.

She needed to take his mind off the cold until their help arrived to jumpstart the car, but what could she talk about, she didn’t want to remind him of his underemployed state, or anyone’s romantic entanglements.

“Hey, remember that play we did in sixth grade?” She asked suddenly.

The play itself was a messy affair, they did the Christmas Carol for extra credit, She was the Ghost of Christmas Past, Tony was the Ghost of Christmas Present—a task he and his butler went above and beyond to do because Tony, unlike the rest of them had actually read the book, and wanted to have a monologue that was cut out of the play about bakers being forced to close their ovens depriving the poor of their one good meal a week, but apparently it was too spicy for their teacher—and Steve and Bucky were extras, and because of a gender disparity, Steve had been cast as Bucky’s grandmother, something the boys played up for laughs.

“Yeah, Steve borrowed one of his great grandmother’s dresses for the costume, and I had to help balance him because he was so determined to stoop over for dramatic effect, which was really bad for his back,” Bucky laughed fondly, like he had for years, “And you were so adorable in that angel costume.”

“Excuse me, I was supposed to be terrifying,” Natasha replied haughtily, and Bucky laughed even harder, which Natasha was struck at how, how beautiful he looked when he laughed.

Her eyes followed the shape of his jaw, the dimple in his chin, his head thrown back showing off the lines of his neck, and the shape of his chest underneath the layers that Natasha’s mind quickly filled in what that looked like with thick muscular arms and pectorals, a strand of hair came out of the ponytail and dangled for a moment, her eyes following it like Liho to a cat toy. She fought down the impulse to tuck it behind his ear.

“And Tony tried to steal the show, and the director tried to get Tony to tone it down because they didn’t want him out staging the Scrooge.”

Natasha was pulled out of a soft fantasy of being held against that chest and nestled in his thick warm arms, which she shoved out of her mind.

This was Bucky, the five-year-old who snuck into her ballet class because he was bored, the kid who loyally stuck by ornery Stevie Rogers, didn’t care about Tony Stark’s wealth, and told a little Christmas Present that he was an Easter Present. He was her friend, and any romantic relationship she was in ended in disaster, and she didn’t think she could handle losing his friendship because she gave into inappropriate impulses.

Maybe there might be someone she can pick up on tinder by New Years, and starting off the year with a one-night stand might be enough to fuck those feelings out of her system.

She sneezed, her nose burned and realized why, she wasn’t getting sick, but her nose was starting to drip from the cold.

“You okay?” Bucky asked.

“I’m fine,” Natasha dismissed, and she could see from the disbelieving look on his face, she didn’t convince him, “besides they’ll be here soon.”

Bucky held out his arm, “We can share if you want.”

Natasha shivered and cursing her own weakness, and she noticed his eyes softened a little, his cheeks were slightly pink, and some part of her mind pointed out that it might not be from the cold, she dismissed that thought firmly.

She leaned in and wrapped her arm around his chest, the soft downy coat didn’t conceal his firm body underneath, and she mentally thought about the bitter suburbanite who might have tried to insult Bucky by calling him a beefcake.

Her heart began to race and she absorbed his warmth, hoping that she gave him enough to keep him comfortable too.

She stayed like this, they kept bringing up memories, then moved on to what they watched on YouTube and Netflix and then Natasha pulled away from Bucky the moment she saw a pair of headlights approach from ahead. Bucky looked a little sad, but he let her go.

They opened the door to wave over the approaching car, and the pickup truck pulled over, and the passenger side door swung open.

“Your savior is here!” announced Loki, in his dark green peacoat and yellow scarf fluttering in his movements, flourishing as if he had arrived by magic.

The driver of the car, a shorter dark-haired woman in a white coat and pants with a light grey scarf around her neck and ears, popped open the hood of the truck, and pulled a pair of jumper cables out of the truck’s cabin, Natasha quickly did the same with the hood of her car, and climbed out.

“Thanks for coming, I’m Natasha,” Natasha greeted the woman who already started attaching the positive side of her battery to the jumper cables.

“Brunnhilde, but everyone calls me Valkyrie,” Valkyrie said, holding a spare hand out to shake, and handed Natasha the insulated hand grip of the other positive clamp, which Natasha added to her positive edge while Bucky greeted Loki.

“Thanks for the rescue,” Natasha nodded, and she attached the red clip to the positive end of her battery.

“Now, ground the negative end onto the chassis, and I’ll start the Truck,” Valkyrie gestured.

“Any way I can help?” Bucky offered.

“Keep track of time, we need to have this run uninterrupted for five minutes before we give the Corvette a restart and then the battery will be done self-recharging by the time we drive back to the house,” Valkyrie said dismissively and Bucky pulled out his phone to start the timer.

“You seem to know a lot about this process,” Bucky asked, obviously wanting to get to know their savior.

“We’ve got an old truck that shorts out a lot, and when we’re trying to contain coyotes and stray dogs, we need to drive long distances sometimes for work,” Valkyrie dismissed and she started the truck, it roared to life and Natasha heard a little beep as Bucky started the timer.

“Stray dogs?” Natasha asked.

“I work for Animal Control, used to work in Nevada, but I got a job transfer to here, the animals are both the same and both very different,” Valkyrie shrugged, “And my mentor’s sons knew who was hiring.”

“Mentor?” Natasha asked.

“I’ve known these two when they were younger,” Valkyrie said, gesturing to Loki, “I was a teenaged mentee to their mom, then I served as soon as I was old enough.”

“Served?” Natasha asked.

“Army, two tours until I was discharged,” Valkyrie shrugged, but Natasha noticed she looked a little uncomfortable so she changed the subject.

“Still, thanks for the rescue, I appreciate it,” Natasha nodded.

“No skin off my back, the party was getting a little stuffy, and the booze hasn’t arrived yet,” Valkyrie shrugged, “But Thor’s responsible for that, and turns out some guys needed some white wine for some apple pie.”

Natasha gave them a shit-eating grin, “So that’s the Rogers family’s secret ingredient.”

“Don’t tell Steve I told you.”

Natasha laughed, and Bucky lifted his phone.

“It’s time!”

Valkyrie gestured for Natasha to start her car, and her sweet wonderful Corvette roared to life with a second chance.

Satisfied, Valkyrie unhooked the two vehicles and Loki entered his truck with a flourish, and Bucky bolted back into the passenger’s seat.

“I’ll meet you at the house, hopefully, Thor will arrive with the booze, I wouldn’t mind a drink,” Valkyrie climbed into the truck, and the drove back down the road.

*-*-*

The Odinson family cabin was decorated with multiple strings of lights, to the point that is shown like a beacon in the dark with a golden flourish, almost as if the very cabin was made of gold with more Christmas lights to look festive, trees and the front garden appeared to be covered in twinkling lights. The path leading to the house seemed to resemble some kind of festive rainbow.

Next to the pathway in his bright tinkling glory was Thor’s straw goat.

“Twenty bucks Thor’s sprayed it with flame retardant,” Bucky muttered.

“Twenty bucks it’s been slowly smoldering on the inside this whole time and will be a pile of ashes come morning,” Natasha countered.

Bucky was in awe of the lights, and he understood it was because of the work of Thor, Loki, and their former babysitter and employee of their father’s Heimdall.

Natasha drove up, the clock on her dashboard was twenty minutes after they had jump started her car, and she pursed her lips.

Bucky remembered the solid feel of Natasha in his arms less than a half hour ago. A small bit of him mourning her absence and he kept his attention on the lights to hide his feelings before he could shove them back into his Percy Shelley like hard heart, he didn’t need Natasha to feel uncomfortable, their friendship was way too valuable to him to endanger that.

Steve greeted them like a mother hen, Sam behind him a lot less worried but quickly gave the two of them two hot steaming mugs of apple cider, which both drank gratefully and eager to get warm.

“Val, you made it,” a familiar voice called, sounding relieved, and Bucky and Natasha turned to see a familiar looking man with slightly shorter hair, his glasses replaced with contact lenses, slight grey at his temple, but still undeniably the same Bruce Banner of three years ago, their savior—no not Loki—wrapping her arms around him before giving him a kiss on his cheek.

Bucky quickly turned to glance at Natasha, but she was definitely not looking in their direction, and Bucky’s heart sank.

Natasha was still not over Bruce, and Bucky had no place there.

“Come on Barnes, it’s cold right here,” Natasha insisted, she grabbed his hand and pulled Bucky to the fireplace where a yule log was merrily crackling, her hand still in his, and almost like he wanted to say goodbye, he gave her hand a squeeze.

Natasha shot him a grin gratefully, and Bucky noticed she was still wearing his scarf, so Bucky felt content, he’ll take being at her side, no matter what form their friendship she’d receive.

“Excuse me, but are you a Mr. James Barnes?” a strange man with an African accent asked from behind, and Bucky turned to see a man who looked like an elegant ebony statue, or a wild graceful panther made human, his dark eyes shrewd and intelligent. “My name is T’Challa Udaku, and I’ve heard a little about you from the party here, and I was most eager to meet you.”

Bucky blinked, and he felt Natasha let go of his hand, and he felt like his heart stayed in her palm because he could feel its absence.

“I’ll let you guys go,” she said and left.

“James Barnes,” Bucky began introducing himself and holding his hand out.

T’Challa turned out to be an interesting guy, he recently inherited a family business from his recently retired father, and Bucky realized he heard of this guy in the news shortly before he quit Hydra.

Pierce had tried to talk him getting more information in an illegal manner so Hydra could engage a hostile takeover on T’Challa’s Company when T’Challa won a legal battle with his cousin over the inheritance of the company, it was the breaking point that made Bucky quit instead.

But Bucky never told T’Challa that.

Instead they talked about their families, besides the estranged cousin who T’Challa was slowly trying to make amends with—T’Challa didn’t talk about him much besides that—his parents, his father retired, his mother the head of HR in their company, and his recently graduated from college child prodigy younger sister Shuri.

T’Challa was really proud of Shuri, she recently graduated with her Masters in Mechanical Engineering, she was working her way up to the head of Research and Development of their company.

Bucky talked about his parents, his mother a retired school teacher and his father a retired civil engineer who helped build a few bridges outside of town. His sister and her husband in Shelbyville Indiana and their children.

He also talked about Steve and Sam—pointed them out on the dance floor where Sam was trying to get Steve to do more than what he dubbed the “Shepard Shuffle”—but Bucky would have to explain Mass Effect to T’Challa to explain the “Dance”, in truth Steve just couldn’t dance—and how he met Steve when he was little, and they became instant best friends.

T’Challa talked a little about his work with his company, and Bucky did express how interesting that job would be, they were engineering tech and introducing the tech worldwide, which was a new direction for the Engineering firm, and Bucky explained that he did a little of that before he got The Internship, and then talked a little about his current job at the pine tree farm.

“Then what did you do before you joined that farm?” T’Challa asked, and Bucky sighed.

“I used to work for Hydra Inc, I wasn’t very high up, but I left the company after I realized I was being asked to work unreported overtime and to do some tasks that I felt were wrong, so I left the company on not so good terms with the higher-ups,” Bucky admitted.

“It sounds like it was a long time coming,” T’Challa observed.

Bucky nodded, and he noticed that T’Challa looked thoughtful.

Then came the discussion of pets, and like the proud cat dad he was, Bucky had tons of pictures of Alpine, and T’Challa surprised him with a picture of a magnificent black panther, but the conversation changed to conservation, as it turned out T’Challa’s panther was part of a breeding program, and his panther was ineligible for release after he developed diabetes as a cub because of an improper diet was given to him by poachers who tried to sell him in the pet trade, and many of his Panther’s adult cubs were released into areas where the genetic diversity of the wild population was low.

Bucky was in awe, but he had Alpine neutered because Alpine lived in an area where there were too many stray cats and he didn’t want Alpine hurt if he got into a fight over a female in heat if Alpine ever got lost.

T’Challa was applauding Bucky’s responsible pet ownership when an elegant queenly figure approached them in this gorgeous black and gold satin dress.

“Ah, Mama, this is Mr. James Barnes, the gentleman you heard about from Baba’s old associate. Mr. Barnes, this is my mother Ramonda Udaku,” T’Challa introduced, and Bucky remembered she was the head of their HR department and an accomplished businesswoman in her own right.

“It’s a pleasure ma’am,” Bucky said as he shook her hand. Then a younger voice cleared her throat.

“And this is Shuri, as I believe I told you about her too,” T’Challa gestured to a young woman that reminded Bucky a bit like the Tony Stark he knew growing up, a brilliant genius who loved their work, only instead of the disinterest Bucky saw in Tony’s own family, Ramonda had her hand affectionately on her daughter’s shoulder, and T’Challa had the affectionate grin Bucky shared with his own younger sister, and with that extra boost, Bucky could foresee Shuri surpassing Tony someday.

Not too hard, Tony was always impressed when someone younger outwitted him, and Tony’s last two interns had definitely done that, both beginning prosperous education and job prospects because of Tony’s own unwavering support that he never got from Howard Stark.

“So, how did he do?” She asked her son.

“He did quite well, I believe you wanted to talk to him yourself?”

“Uh….” Bucky began nervously.

“Mr. Barnes, how would you like to come into my office sometime later this week or next week and we can conduct a proper job interview?” Ramonda asked with a smile, “Your resume quite impressed us, as was your character review with Detective Fury.”

“And I could use a man like you in my department,” Shuri insisted with a shrug.

“I-I’m honored, shall I come in as soon as it’s convenient?” Bucky asked barely believing his luck, it was a freaking Christmas miracle.

“Please come in on the second at eight am, we’re celebrating Kwanzaa this year, Okoye will see you then,” Ramonda said with a nod, and Bucky had a feeling that he still had to jump through some hoops, but it sounded like they really wanted him.

Bucky left the conversation—impromptu job interview?—feeling dazed and giddy when he wandered toward the food bowl where he bumped into a rather excited looking Loki.

“Barnes, you might want to head to the backyard, there’s a fight about to start.”

“WHAT?!”

*-*-*

Natasha stepped back, and she noticed Ramonda and T’Chaka slowly approaching, T’Chaka, however, was soon in a conversation with Tony Stark about something, and then realized that the younger man must have been T’Chaka’s son T’Challa, and Natasha laughed to herself a little when she realized that the Udakus must have been the old associates who called her adopted dad recently.

She didn’t really know them that well, they only interacted with Nick on a professional level, but one Christmas party when she was little, she played a with the kids while the adults networked and socialized, but that was about it when it came to their interactions. But Bucky was in a good place, so she stood back and wandered the party to see who was all here.

The Odinsons knew a lot of people, somewhere old business associates of the late Odin and Frigga, others were friends of Thor and Loki, who often befriended people of all classes and backgrounds so there was a massive mix of people.

Rhodey was here, and his date, and one Carol Danvers, and Natasha was impressed with Carol, but Carol was busy talking to her old friend Jessica Drew, who Natasha knew by reputation, and a little intern named Kamala Khan who Natasha greeted with a grin before the young woman wandered off, apparently, she was waiting for people, so Natasha let her go.

She also recognized Nakia, an old friend of hers from college, who recently came back from working in the Peace Corps, and was likely to return shortly, and she and Natasha were glad to catch up for about five minutes before Nakia spotted another friend she wanted to catch up with, so she and Natasha parted ways with a promise of a lunch after New Year’s. Nakia politely turned down Natasha’s jiu-jitsu offer citing a busy schedule, unfortunately.

Then she bumped into Valkyrie, the woman who helped them jumpstart her car, Bruce was nowhere to be seen.

“Hey Valkyrie,” Natasha began, “Thanks again for your help tonight.”

“Eh, it was no big deal, and it gave me a break from trying to talk to all these people,” Valkyrie shrugged, “drink?”

“Sure,” Natasha shrugged, and Valkyrie walked over to the bar where the glasses clinked and Valkyrie pulled out a whiskey bottle.

“I feel like an Old Fashioned, want one?” she asked, and Natasha nodded, and Valkyrie began to mix the drinks, carefully twisting an orange peel into the glass and served the first glass to Natasha, and the two women began to sip the drinks.

“So where did you learn how to mix the drink, I’ve never had this with Cranberry bitters,” Natasha asked. The whiskey, cranberry and orange flavors gently mixing on her tongue.

“I served as a part-time bartender for a little while in Vegas, that’s where I met Bruce, he was there for a physics conference and I served him a ginger ale, turns out he had just ended things with a girlfriend, and just needed an ear to talk to,” Valkyrie shrugged.

“Yeah, that was me.”

“Oh,” Valkyrie said a little surprised, then “I don’t blame you for what happened, by the way, Bruce was scared of his temper, and in some ways he still is.”

“Yeah, I figured out that I couldn’t save him from his temper about four days after our break up, and I had a friend there as a sounding board when I reached that conclusion,” Natasha shrugged, weirdly enough she felt great talking to Valkyrie, she was a fellow peer and a good woman.

“It took Bruce a lot longer, and I bumped into him again a few days later, and well, we bonded through our anger. The Mad Scientist and the Bitter Veteran, and I dragged him to my jiu-jitsu dojo to work off some steam, then after that, we found another way to let of some more steam. It was after one of these jiu-jitsu classes that we bumped into Thor and Loki, and Bruce decided to stop running away from what bothered him in New York. I had a job opportunity here, so we got married on our way to the airport. Thor was witness and the Elvis impersonator in the drive through chapel.”

Natasha paused and realized why Valkyrie was telling her this, not to brag, but tell her that she didn’t need to worry about Bruce, which meant this worried Bruce that he’d bump into her, and might be why he didn’t talk to Natasha at all tonight, to give her space.

Space that Natasha appreciated because she realized just then just how over Bruce she was. Her heart rose a little like a helium balloon being released by a small child and bouncing off the ceiling. It felt freeing.

“So, jiu-jitsu huh?” Natasha asked.

“Yeah, just moved here and haven’t found a good gym, which is too bad, I’ve been a purple belt for over a year and a half, but don’t have a gym to advance to the brown belt… What?” Valkyrie asked, and Natasha realized that she might have looked a little too eager.

“I have a pamphlet you might just want to read,” Natasha just said cryptically and walked over to the coat racks to pull out her purse and the jiu-jitsu pamphlets she forgot was there until now, and Valkyrie eyed the pamphlet, then Natasha with a grin.

“So, just how good is your Sensei?”

“Sensei Korg is a very good master,” Natasha said with pride, and she saw Valkyrie stare at her in surprise.

“Coral Belt Korg?” Valkyrie asked, her voice wasn’t in awe as much as a pleasant surprise, “The revolutionary?”

“The very same,” Natasha nodded, coral belts were only awarded to black belts who have made massive contributions to jiu-jitsu as a martial art form.

Valkyrie regarded her with some surprise, “Show me.”

“We’ll take this outside then.”

The women asked Thor for some sweatpants, it wouldn’t do to spar in dresses after all, and passed Loki on their way to the backyard, who looked like he was up to something.

“Odds are we’ll have an audience expecting at catfight, Frigga’s little brat loves causing a stir,” Valkyrie sighed, and Natasha shrugged.

They found some space in the backyard illuminated with the Christmas lights, both women wearing some spare running shoes because the ground was way too cold for bare feet and with their jackets on, in the place of gi, they began to circle each other, arms brought up in a defensive guard and the two began to circle each other.

Natasha noticed the excellent footwork and watched Valkyrie’s muscles were tightly controlled to the point Natasha could barely get a read on it. Her heart thudded as the adrenaline pumped in her veins, both women then dove in and gripped each other and in a show of equal strength froze, Natasha could read where Valkyrie put pressure, but she could see Valkyrie would read where Natasha could counter any one of her other attempts to grapple, at least not without risking injury by wearing inappropriate gear.

Natasha stood up firmly and relaxed, and Valkyrie did too, both women shaking hands as equals. On the dojo mat, they would practice the moves for real without neutralizing the moves preemptively.

It was a draw, but one Natasha felt really good about.

To anyone in the audience that accumulated outside, however, the fight looked extremely anticlimactic. A handful of the audience members returned disappointed, others kept glaring at Loki. Loki just laughed at how gullible some people were, and Natasha wasn’t surprised that some people fell for how such a troll he was.

“Well, it looks like there’s a dojo I can join after all,” Valkyrie acknowledged and turned towards the crowd watching them from the door, “the show’s over.”

“Val?” Bruce appeared, and by his side looking equally as frazzled, was Bucky, both men looking like they were prepared for the worst, and were surprised when the worst didn’t happen.

“It’s fine, big guy, was just checking out your ex,” Valkyrie said with a wink, and Natasha sniggered.

“In what way?” Bruce seemed a little bewildered, but Valkyrie just laughed, and Bruce seemed to relax when he realized she was only teasing him.

“Natasha’s part of a jiu-jitsu dojo, and I might finally get my brown belt after five years of working my ass off, Natasha’s gym offers the class and they’ve got a promotion going on for the new year.”

Bruce suddenly relaxed and his wife kissed him on the cheek as she approached, “Ah, that sounds like fun, does Natasha mind though?”

“Nope,” Natasha interrupted, “besides if you tell them I sent you, I get a discount on my membership fees.”

“Ever the paragon of virtue, see you inside Nat.” Valkyrie waved her off and went inside taking Bruce with her.

“So, that was just a friendly spar?” Bucky asked a little bewildered, and Natasha nodded.

“Just a spar, why, did you fall for Loki’s bullshit?”

“No.” Bucky said vehemently but probably meant that he fell for it but was embarrassed to admit it, likely because he was afraid Natasha might have gotten hurt, “It seems like you’re getting along great with Bruce’s new wife?”

“I think we can be friends, yes,” Natasha admitted, and she put her arm around Bucky’s back and turned him back inside, “Now let’s get inside, I’m freezing out here, and I’m the one with a jacket.”

Right on cue, Bucky shivered.

Once inside there were a series of cheers and laughter and Bruce and Valkyrie in front of them gave a quick peck on the cheeks.

“Mistletoe!” someone shouted—Natasha suspected Loki—and Natasha noticed above their heads was a branch of a small green plant with white berries above their heads and Natasha glanced at Bucky, who shifted a little on his feet, either blushing or his face was flushed with the cold.

“Shall we?” Natasha asked, doing what she could to not appear awkward, and Bucky fidgeted for a moment before he bent down half way between them with a nod.

“I will if you will,” he answered, and Natasha tilted her head up to meet him halfway for the kiss.

His mouth was warm and soft, and he gently raised his hand to cradle the back of her head tenderly, kinda like she daydreamed people did when she was nothing but a foolish young teenager who never experienced a romantic kiss in her life.

Her insides shivered a little as if her internal organs had been replaced with gelatin or one of those Japanese rain-drop-cake agar-desserts she saw cooking tutorials for on YouTube once. She shivered a little, and she gently pressed back, tasting the sweet apple, cinnamon, clove, and allspice in the cider they drank earlier, the same scent from his scarf permeated her nostrils.

Then he let go, his hand gently leaving the back of her head and his warm presence leaving, and she felt the loss with a slight pang but schooled her emotions from loss to a playful grin.

“Damn Barnes, when did you become such a good kisser?” she teased and backed away a little, giving his free hand a little squeeze before letting go and walking away.

She must have been an incredible kisser too because he still looked a little dazed and a little saddened that she was leaving, but Natasha had an image to maintain if she wanted to be taken seriously as a badass, and not someone who was melting on the inside.

She lost track of her drink, so contented herself with another cup of apple cider for the rest of the evening, after she returned the sweats back to Thor and spent the rest of the evening mingling with her face a little colder than before.

Once people started avoiding mistletoe, Loki gathered the rest of the mistletoe, and a few times gripped one of the sprigs like one with a dart, only for Thor to confiscate them “before you poke someone’s eye out, Loki”.

When she was ready to head home for the night, hours after she spared with Valkyrie and gained a discount at her gym, she glanced around, Bucky’s coat and Steve and Sam’s car was gone.

And she was still wearing Bucky’s scarf around her neck.

Thor’s straw goat remained standing when she left.

*-*-*  
The drive back to their apartment was quiet, and Alpine was asleep when they got home some after one am. Alpine was supposed to be sleeping on his cat bed, Bucky was warmed to discover his cat was sleeping on his bed instead. Bucky knew he’d wake up to Christmas morning with his cat draped over his face instead. Because of the holiday, Bucky decided he didn’t mind because it would be a special morning.

Steve pulled Sam into bed the moment the second apple pie was deposited in the fridge.

The pie was the sole survivor of the party, saved only by a sign Steve had placed on top of the pie that said it was reserved for Christmas morning and hidden carefully in the kitchen back at the Odinson family cabin, ready for Steve to give to his parents and in-laws in the morning when the two families converged to celebrate Christmas.

They quietly dressed and crawled into bed to the sound of some of their neighbors hurriedly and quietly wrapping presents for the morning, or the sounds of children sneaking out of bed to a last-minute peek until morning.

Bucky crawled under his covers in his underwear, cuddled under his covers, staring at the ceiling in the dark.

Alpine seemed to sense his human had joined him on the bed, because the cat shifted on his pillow and started kneading Bucky’s shoulder in his sleep, pulling Bucky’s thoughts away from the sensation of the kiss.

Away from how his insides were on fire, so hot that Bucky wasn’t sure his Percy Shelley heart survived, reformed and replaced by a lively beating flesh and blood one that was willing to kick down a door and announce to the room at large that he was a man in love.

Instead, Bucky focused on how many layers of blankets were between his bare skin and his cat’s claws. 

When Alpine settled, Bucky went back to contemplating the ceiling, sleep eluding him.

Natasha surprised him by wanting to kiss him back, and she even teased him a little in her usual nature about how good a kisser he was, which surprised him, and his lively heart was pleased.

If he was much younger he would have assumed that meant she liked him back, but as an adult he knew that he’d have to talk to her about it, but that meant putting their friendship on the line because his feelings outgrew their current dynamics, because that crush was not going away like it was supposed to, holding her tight and secure to protect her from the cold in her car and the kiss under the mistletoe pretty much guaranteed that.

If she didn’t return his feelings, he’d have to take a step back, let his feelings cool back into friendship, probably use Tinder to get a date for New Year's Eve, and fuck his unrequited feelings out of his system and return his life to normal. It was the least he could do for Natasha.

Bucky’s eyelids slid over his eyes, and after a few deep inhales he sank into a deep sleep, the day’s emotional events wearing him out until nine am when he woke to Alpine pawing at his face for breakfast and the sound of his roommates scrambling to head out with presents for the nieces and nephews, gift baskets for the parents.

Bucky dressed and left his bedroom, Alpine giving him a series of hungry sharp meows as if he were scolding Bucky on letting him starve while Bucky caught up on rest so selfishly.

“Happy Tuesday to you too bud,” Bucky muttered sleepily, ducking into the kitchen to get out of Steve’s way while they were loading up their car, the cat dish in hand as Bucky deposited wet cat food in it, and the cat sat at the placemat where his food went, impatiently trying to jump up on to the counter, only to discover that Bucky had already put the food on the placemat and put the can away.

“Well that’s what you get for not waiting,” Bucky chuckled after shooing the cat off the countertop firmly and the cat began to eat his wet food while Bucky poured fresh hot coffee from the pot into his mug, and began drinking it from the safety of the kitchen.

Outside in the rest of the apartment Steve and Sam worked as a team to track down where Steve hid Jimmy Wilson’s science kit—"I thought you hid it, Sam!”—while Bucky waited out of the way, pulling out the popcorn from the cupboard and prepped the bag before the microwave, mentally trying to come up with a script he could tell Natasha to present his feelings without making it awkward when she turned it down. 

Sam emerged from their closet with the present for Jimmy already wrapped and ready to join the other presents and Steve began hauling the rest of the gifts to the car before Natasha arrived.

“Hey boys, need any help?” Natasha asked, Liho pathetically mewing from his backpack carrier, a bag with vodka and bingo cards in hand.

“Nope, that’s the last of it, but thanks Natasha,” Steve nodded and Bucky took a deep breath, glancing at Alpine, who just kept eating his breakfast with no interest to what was going on around him, likely wanting to finish eating before Natasha let his brother out of his carrier.

Bucky decided to wait until after Steve and Sam left to have The Conversation.

“Well, that’s the last of it, you guys have fun!” Steve observed and waved them off with Sam following with the pie and the door closed, and Bucky could swear his roommates were more than aware of how he was feeling about Natasha and wanting to get out from underfoot ahead of time.

They stood there in awkward silence for a moment before Bucky muttered, “I’ll get started on the popcorn.”

“Bucky, before we start, I have something to say,” Natasha began, only to be interrupted by a long pathetic meow from her backpack carrier, “after I let him out.”

Bucky nodded, and he got started on the popcorn, it would be ready after their discussion. Liho darted out of his carrier and out of sight while Natasha turned to look Bucky in the eye, and Buck steeled himself with a deep breath.

“I’m ready to talk when you are,” Bucky began with a nod, and Natasha nodded, and plunged forward.

“So, about last night, I liked that kiss, but if I made you feel uncomfortable—"

“You didn’t,” Bucky blurted out, his nervous fluttering heart made him feel like he had a wild panic go through is system and he had a lot of important things to say, “you didn’t make me feel uncomfortable, in fact, I… I liked it, a lot, and I’m-I’m glad you liked it too, but if that’s all you wanted, I’d be okay with that too.”

Time for Bucky to shut up, he realized, he was talking too much.

“Well, that’s good I guess, but I’ve been thinking, we’ve been friends for so long,” Natasha continued.

But Bucky could already guess where this was going, and that probably meant he’d have to download the tinder app later…

“…That maybe it’s time to try something different, yeah things didn’t work with me and Bruce, but that turned out to be for the best, and last night made me realize that there’s someone else I like instead, a lot, and I’d like to find out if that could lead to something more,” Natasha finished, looking into his eyes with the confidence and courage that Bucky had admired since that day he wandered into a ballet class because he was bored out of his tiny little skull.

Now he was desperately hoping that his first guess was wrong and that the ‘someone else’ she was talking about was him.

“Well, if you’re willing,” His voice croaked, and he felt his eyes crinkle a little in happiness, “I would like that a lot too. I really like you, Natasha Romanoff, I think I have for a while.”

“Good,” Natasha announced and then in a matter of fact tone said, “So, I’m gonna kiss you again and let’s see where it goes.”

Bucky didn’t need a second invitation as he rushed up to meet her in the middle again, this time his heart was beating with the thrill, and her touch was so warm and inviting his skin felt alive and his insides started dancing wildly like the swelling of an orchestra during the climax of a movie where the hero and the heroine decide to get married or something—and then the smell of burning popcorn permeated his nose and he had to pull away from her or else the apartment would get set on fire, the fire alarm screeching that there was smoke in the air.

Natasha rushed to open up a couple of windows and Bucky fanning the air around the alarm before pressing the reset button on the alarm, the microwave was opened and the hot kernels were pulled out to sit in the window sill. 

Liho and Alpine took refuge in Bucky’s closet like Alpine always did when cooking in the apartment went wrong.

Once peace, and an apology to the neighbors for the sudden loud noise, was restored to the apartment, the smell of smoke long gone and the windows tightly shut to keep the heat in, Bucky cuddled up on the sofa with Natasha with one final question.

“So, wanna go steady as boyfriend and girlfriend?” Bucky asked.

Natasha raised an eyebrow.

“Hey, just gotta get the communication channels open,” Bucky shrugged and Natasha muttered a “yes” before she kissed him again, the sound of Netflix loading on the television screen. They pulled apart when the cats started play fighting and pinning each other onto the carpet and Natasha began to roll the dice as Bucky entered in “Christmas Movies” on the Netflix search engine.

“Eighteen,” She announced.

“Pine Boughs and Mistletoe, it is.”

The opening beats of “Movement” by Hozier filled the room and Natasha poured each of them a shot and began to pass out random Bingo cards between them, and Bucky pulled the throw blankets over the both of them, and years later they would associate the song with this perfect day.

Even when Winnie Barnes extended the invitation to Christmas Dinner to “Bucky’s new girlfriend” when both Bucky and Natasha asked if she could join them, Lord Fluffkiss getting his annual selfie with Bucky in all his neon orange teddy bear glory with Natasha cuddled next to him and the cats sleeping on their humans’ torsos.

*-*-*

In the car on their way to another Christmas dinner, another such conversation played out.

“Steve, do you think our so-called roommate is going to ask Natasha out already or do you think he’ll continue to pine?”

“If Bucky hasn’t already, I believe Natasha would.”

“Right, tell me, Honey, does mistletoe count as outside interference?”

“I don’t think so Sam, when we made that bet, we both did that with the agreement that ‘outside interference’ would be done with intentional direct human interference, Loki taping mistletoe on doorways as a party decoration doesn’t count. So, I think that means I win that bet.”

“Right, and the wager was the loser wears the lingerie the winner picks on New Year’s right, Steve?”

“That’s right, wear the red one, and I might wear the matching blue one if you’re really good.”

“You spoil me,”

“Worth it.”


End file.
